Why I hope I don’t need to worry about Rob Ford’s polling numbers

A little while back, I posted an excerpt from the most recent book by Michael J. Fox, in which the actor and activist noted a key reason why the will and impact of young voters had largely been ignored by pollsters during the early days of the 2008 presidential election.

“It wasn’t until late in the 2008 contest,” Fox explained in the book, “that pundits realized polling firms calling landlines weren’t reaching young people – who for the most part used only cell phones.”

It fills me with some level of desperate comfort to think that this is also one of the reasons why Rob Ford – whose loss in the our next mayoral election would mean more to me than the victory of any of the other candidates – is currently kicking ass in the polls.

Obviously, it’s not the only factor. A lot of people in Toronto plan to vote for Ford because they’re angry, although they may not know for sure what they’re angry about. A lot of people will vote for Ford because they want change, even though the kind of change he’d bring to City Hall wouldn’t be for the better.

And none of this would matter as much if the the bulk of the votes to Ford’s left weren’t being spread among four other candidates who, God love them, aren’t running very remarkable campaigns. But that’s more of an opinion on the first past the post system, which I’m sure I’ll do a bunch of hollering about in due time.

But the nature of the polling is a factor, and I think it’s one that may be inflating Ford’s numbers. After all, hip young people who love their gadgetry make up a pretty substantial portion of Toronto’s population, and a lot of those people don’t have landlines.

But I think they do have more of an inclination to vote to the left. I usually hate to play the “urban versus suburban” card, but I do think you’ll find a lot more of these voters in the urban areas that are more likely to vote left than in the suburbs. And although I can only speak for my own experience, I’ve seen a much more vocal opposition to Ford on social media networks than I have in the press.

That’s an anecdotal point, of course; my Facebook friends and the people I follow on Twitter may not be representative of these communities as a whole. But if they’re even close, and if the people on those networks aren’t being counted by the pollsters, then the future isn’t as bright for Ford as their poll results suggest.

Now, I don’t know how significant a factor this is. Just because a bunch of us have iPhones certainly doesn’t mean that Ford’s going to lose the election. But it’s comforting to think that he hasn’t got as much support or momentum as it might seem.

I mean, it’s even more comforting to think that this is actually just a huge prank that Toronto’s playing on Ford, and the reason that nobody told me is because they don’t think I can keep a secret. But the chances of that are pretty slim, you know?

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